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Good morning, and welcome to the 28th meeting in 2025 of the Social Justice and Social Security Committee.

We have apologies from Collette Stevenson and Michael Marra.

I welcome Sarah Boyack to the meeting; you are very welcome, as always, Sarah.

Our first item of business is a decision on whether to take item 4 in private. Are we all agreed to take that item in private?

Members indicated agreement.

Agenda item 2 is our third evidence session on the Wellbeing and Sustainable Development (Scotland) Bill.

I welcome to the meeting Jenny Munro, policy practice and research officer, Royal Town Planning Institute Scotland; Duncan Thorp, policy and public affairs manager, Social Enterprise Scotland; Emma Hunter, policy officer, Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland; and Ellie Twist, co-convener for the United Kingdom Environmental Law Association Scotland. I thank you all for helping us with our consideration of Sarah Boyack’s member’s bill.

We will go straight to questions, and I will start.

The policy memorandum for the bill explores the concept of

“policy coherence for sustainable development”.

Is that a desirable objective, and is this bill the best way of achieving it? Do you have any other comments in relation to how we secure that policy coherence—assuming, of course, that it is a desirable thing to have?

Who would like to start? Jenny Munro, you have indicated that in the right way. However, if nobody indicates that they wish to answer, I will pick someone. I thank Jenny for indicating.

My amendment 128 and consequential amendments 138, 141 and 142 would require the Scottish Government to produce regulations about the regulation and oversight of persons who would carry out assisted dying under the bill. The purpose of that is to ensure the safety and wellbeing of the people who are provided with assisted dying. Such regulations should include the regulation of settings in which assisted dying may or may not take place, regulations determining and making provision for the role of Healthcare Improvement Scotland and the Care Inspectorate in regulation and scrutiny, and provisions for a process through which to raise concerns about the provision of assisted dying to a person.

The bill is silent on institutional responsibilities for the delivery of assisted dying; it merely permits practitioners to provide assisted dying in certain circumstances. Even the most basic organisational model setting out duties and responsibilities is missing. That is something that the Scottish Partnership for Palliative Care has concerns about, and I agree with it.

The bill contains no requirements that the provision of assisted dying should be subject to any system of regulation or scrutiny. Although assisted dying might take place in the NHS, it might also take place in the private or third sector, as Jackie Baillie indicated. Either way, surely there is a need to provide powers to scrutinise and regulate a life-and-death activity such as assisted dying.

The bill makes no provision for a process by which people might raise concerns about the provision of assisted dying to a person. It is likely that, from time to time, people might wish to raise a concern about the assisted dying process and the provision of assisted dying to a person in a specific instance—or, indeed, to raise concerns about the role of any organisation that is facilitating assisted dying more generally.

The bill should make provision for such a process. My amendments seek powers that would enable the Scottish Government to establish a system of scrutiny and regulation of assisted dying and to establish a process by which people could raise a concern about specific instances of assisted dying processes and provision. That process would be established in regulations under the affirmative procedure, which would have to come into force before other provisions in the act could be implemented.

We are in danger of agreeing, Mr Whittle. That is the point that I was coming on to make.

However, the caveat that I would add is that the amendments do not guarantee any of that. They guarantee that a palliative care support plan would be offered, but whether the resource would be found to deliver that plan is another matter. They could guarantee that an anticipatory care plan or a future care plan was sought to be drafted, but the individual might or might not comply with that. That would tick another box, but it would not guarantee the delivery of anything.

Even if palliative care is a right, guaranteeing its delivery is outwith the scope of the bill. Later we will return to the issue of why the bill might not be able to provide the safeguards that some people would like.

I agree with Mr Johnson—I was about to make a similar point. Those who believe that the definition and the eligibility criteria need to be refined further will, I hope, back amendment 83 and its consequential amendments in the group, and look to work ahead of stage 3 to do just that. However, it is only right that, in refining the definition and those criteria, we do so from a perspective of having greater, and not fewer, safeguards.

I will say one more thing in relation to my set of amendments in this group. In the debate on a previous group, it was mentioned that Social Security Scotland is taking away the requirement for a six-month prognosis in order to fast-track benefits, but that is, by and large, a significantly different matter. It was done for fast-tracking to ensure that people got the highest rate of award and that there were no reviews, and that payment could be backdated up to 26 weeks from the application date, in order to get as much money into people’s pockets as quickly as possible, in a non-stigmatising way, to support them with their life. In contrast, the bill is about assisting people to die, so there is a very different set of circumstances in relation to the six-month rule. It is important to put that on the record.

With regard to other amendments in this group, I will touch on issues around palliative care in relation to Rhoda Grant’s amendment 25 and Brian Whittle’s amendment 145, and issues around social care in relation to Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 219. I have amendments on similar issues in later groups, with regard to assessment of a terminally ill adult, which I hope that committee members will support at that point. More generally, I am content that it is desirable to enhance safeguards in such ways as I think the members I have mentioned seek to do, and I look forward to hearing the contributions from colleagues.

I move amendment 83.

The debate has been quite lengthy. In summing up, my amendments throughout the legislation have been lodged in partnership with the umbrella organisation, the Scottish Partnership for Palliative Care; it provides the secretariat for the cross-party group on palliative care, which I convene. The partnership organisation has surveyed its members in detail. Although each individual organisation will have its own views on assisted dying, the partnership has no view and is not aligned. It believes that, on balance, the amendments in my name would put reasonable safeguards in place.

I put on record, as have other members, that my view is that the bill should not proceed, but I take seriously my responsibility as a member of the Scottish Parliament. Irrespective of my personal view on the legislation, I believe that I should make it as robust as possible, which has inspired my amendments that we will be looking at over the next few weeks.

I will not say any more about my set of amendments, as I think that the point about the need for a prognosis with a timescale, versus a completely open-ended approach, has been well made. I think that the member who is in charge of the bill is wrestling with that, as are committee members, and I am sure that the Parliament will return to that issue at stage 3.

Clearly, I would rather that committee members supported my amendments at stage 2. It is important to put on record that the amendments do not directly secure any service or right to palliative care support plans, anticipatory or future care plans, or a right to palliative care. Moreover, just because there is a palliative care support plan, that does not mean that there is the resource to deliver it.

Dr Gulhane mentioned issues relating to anticipatory care planning. I know very well that one of the main issues is the reluctance of family members and care staff to talk about such planning. There is a cultural reticence to do so. That makes it all the more important that we ensure that people who seek assisted dying can make an informed choice. If a person is seeking to take that route, there is no time to back away and for someone else to say, “Look, here’s what palliative care could do for you. Let’s look at this to make an informed choice.”

I will take an intervention in a little while. The bill must be more robust, and I have a series of amendments that would have that effect. However, I agree with Elena Whitham that the provisions in section 7 are a good starting point for building in some of the safeguards that I would like to see.

I press amendment 83.

Amendment 83 and consequential amendments 97, 108 and 119 more clearly and tightly define the population of people who might be deemed eligible for assisted dying and bring the definition closer to the stated policy intention of the bill.

The definition that is used in the bill is imprecise, which I believe was well illustrated by the first grouping. Key terms in the definition, such as “advanced” and “progressive”, do not have accepted standard definitions. There are multiple ways to define premature mortality. Using the definition in the bill to determine eligibility for assisted dying is therefore likely to result in a lack of clarity for the public and for medical practitioners who are tasked with assessing eligibility.

We have already heard from members about the challenge that medical professionals will have, irrespective of what shape the bill takes should it eventually come on to the statute book. The combination of an imprecise definition and the application of the individual judgment of the assessing medical practitioner will likely lead to inconsistencies in who is deemed eligible.

The policy memorandum, which I have already referred to, states:

“It is not the intention that people suffering from a progressive disease/illness/condition which is not at an advanced stage but may be expected to cause their death (but which they may live with for many months/years) would be able to access assisted dying.”

The definition in the bill is very different from the one that is in the policy memorandum and, as I said during the discussion on the previous group, I believe that there is a disconnect. The current definition is not an effective way to identify a narrow group of people who are near the end of their life. As drafted, the definition would likely include some people who would otherwise live for a considerable period.

The definition in the bill is not precise enough, which will lead to confusion and a variation in interpretation. That could mean that people with years to live are deemed eligible—that is pretty clear—which is at odds with the policy memorandum that I have read out. My amendments would qualify the definition in section 2 by adding an additional paragraph to section 3(1) on eligibility. That is a bit different from Daniel Johnson’s amendment in the previous group, because we are not creating a new definition of terminal illness, but we are saying that there are additional criteria to meet to access assisted dying. That is a variance from the amendment in the previous group that the committee did not agree to.

Will the member give way?